A Texas man allegedly held his girlfriend hostage to abuse her for at least six months at his apartment, where he bolted down the windows and locked the front door from the outside to prevent her from escaping, according to police and the victim’s family.
Kenneth Leon Wright, 41, threatened to kill his girlfriend if she ever tried to leave the boarded-up apartment in Houston, investigators revealed as Wright appeared in court Saturday, KHOU reported.
Wright would punch her in the face if she tried to leave — as he did just two days before he was finally arrested on Friday, prosecutors told the judge.
And although Wright would on rare occasions take the girlfriend to her mother’s house, he would make sure that her family never learned where he was keeping her, and would hang up the phone if they tried to call, the woman’s sister, Shenita Carter, told ABC13.
However, the girlfriend eventually managed to sneak a call through to her loved ones, and her mom was able to track down the address and call for a welfare check.
Her sister finally got to see the conditions she’d been kept in once police arrested Wright on Friday.
“The windows have nails in them,” she told ABC 13, while also pointing out how the door was locked from the outside and the windows boarded up with plywood.
“[It’s] disgusting and sad the fact that this is how she had been living,” Carter said.
Wright is charged with aggressive kidnapping and assault of a household member, according to jail records.
He is being held on a $225,000 bail at the Harris County Jail and is due back in court on Sept. 24.
Carter acknowledged that Wright, a landscaper, was paying for her sister’s rent and food — but said that does not excuse the prison-like living situation and abuse she endured.
When an ABC13 reporter knocked at the apartment, a woman claiming to be Wright’s current girlfriend answered. She denied he’d been holding his ex against her will, insisting he was just taking care of her.
The Harris County District Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for more info.
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